Lamar County, Mississippi Genealogy and History

 

Ann Allen Geoghegan County Coordinator

Jeff Kemp - State Coordinator    
Ann Allen Geoghegan & Denise Wells - Assistant State Coordinators


 

Marion County W. P. A. History

 

CHAPTER I
FORMATION
 

NAME


   
  There seems to be a division of opinions as to why Marion County was so named. In Dunbar Rowland's “Mississippi” Volume I page 166 we find the positive statement that the county was hrefd in honor of General Francis Marion of Revolutionary War fame, but according to information gathered from some of the older citizens in the county, the href Marion might have been chosen by the early settlers in memory of the district in South Carolina from whence they came, Marion District. In the latter event, however the chances are that the district of Marion, South Carolina was hrefd in honor of the above mentioned general, a fact which would make Marion County indirectly hrefd in his honor.

         Since there is a possibility the county is indebted to General Marion for its href, it might be interesting to know a little about him. From Compton's Pictured Encyclopedia we learn that he was a member of the provincial congress in 1775 which voted money for the raising of troops. Marion assumed military duties as captain of a South Carolina band of soldiers and was rapidly promoted, but when the capitol of the province, Charleston, was captured, he and a small band of troops took to the forests and swamps and became known as Marion's Brigade, he himself earning the nick-href of “Swamp-Fox” as applied by Colonel Tarleton, the British Commander. By their unique method of warfare Marion and his troops were able during the Revolutionary War to hinder the British forces from overcoming South Carolina for months and at the same time they were keeping alive the patriotic enthusiasm of the settlers and giving Congress time to send into the section a larger army.

         The fighting spirit which General Marion exhibited in fighting the British was of the same type his grandfather exhibited in his home country, France, in 1690 when he preferred to be exiled rather than relinquish his Huguenot religion.

         After the thirteen colonies had won their independence, Marion served terms in the state senate, and was a member of the state constitutional convention in 1790.


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